Collar for mounting around the neck of an animal

ABSTRACT

At its edges for assembly, the collar has protruding tongues (14) on a rib (16), and a wide central part (17) and an outer end (18). When the collar is to be assembled, each tongue (14) is passed through a C-shaped first slot (30), and the rib (16) of the tongue is placed in the bottom of the C-shaped first slot (30), and the outer end (18) of the tongue is snapped through the C-shaped second slot (40), which does not allow the wider central part (17) of the tongue to pass. The tongues (14) are hereby locked in an associated pair of a first slot (30) and a second slot (40).

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The invention concerns a collar for mounting around the neck of ananimal and of the type which comprises a web of flexible material havinga protruding tongue and a through slot through which the tongue may bepassed when the collar is mounted around the neck of the animal.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Such collars are mainly used for pets or domesticated animals, such asdogs and cats, but also for rodents (e.g. guinea pigs) and for birds,but may also be used for domestic animals in general. A collar of thepresent type is placed around the neck of an animals, e.g. a dog, whereit is desired that the dog shall be prevented from licking or biting alesion or a wound on its body or legs, since the dog might bite abandage and tear it off or lick a wound clean of ointment with which thewound has been treated. A collar of the present type placed around theneck of an animal ensures that the animal cannot contact the placeconcerned on the body with its mouth and cause further injury byprotracting the healing of a wound, or that an ointment on the woundcannot be licked off and cause injury in the mouth or digestive systemof the dog.

Collars of the present type are typically made of a strong. plasticsmaterial in the form of a sheet, a web or a film in a thickness of 1 mmor less. Typically, the collars have the shape of a circular ring orcircular ring sector, said collar being assembled around the neck of theanimal by joining along two radially extending edges of the circularring sector, thereby imparting to the collar the shape of a truncatedcone shell or a funnel whose edge, which is defined by the small circleof the truncated cone, engages the neck of the animal and is optionallyattached to a band around the neck of the animal while the head of theanimal is present in the funnel with the "face" directed toward theopening the funnel, which is defined by the great circle of thetruncated cone shell. The opening angle of the truncated cone shell maybe large or small and be adapted to the animal species concerned, andfor some animal species, such as e.g. cage birds, collars having a verylarge opening angle may be used, and here the collars may even have theapproximate shape of a flat circular ring disc when placed around theneck of the cage bird.

FR 2 630 297 discloses a collar having a first tongue for passingthrough a straight slot in the collar. A second tongue directed in theopposite direction of the first tongue and integral therewith forms ahook adapted to be passed through a second slot and thereby lock thecollar in its assembled state.

U.S. Pat. No. 3 036 554 shows such a collar which, when placed aroundthe neck of a dog, is assembled by means of laces or staples. It isdifficult and time-consuming to fit the laces or staples when assemblingthe collar, and to remove them when the collar is to be removed.

U.S. Pat. No. 3 072 098 concerns a collar for a chinchilla. This collaris assembled by means of loose parts in the form of a strip having twoU-bends which are attached to the collar by means of two staples.

U.S. Pat. No. 5 012 764 describes a collar which is assembled by meansof complementary fasteners, e.g. in the form of loops and hooks whichare fastened to the overlapping ends of the collar.

DE 4 100 851 concerns a collar whose overlapping ends are assembled bymeans of snap fasteners.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

All these known collars for animals are assembled by means of looseparts, or parts which have to be applied to the collar in themanufacture.

A collar as defined in claim 1 may be made of the base material merelyby punching, and the tongues and slots of the collar constitute acomplete closing mechanism, thereby obviating the necessity of applyingfurther means which are to provide a closing mechanism.

Insertion of the tongue into two slots provides a relatively rigidassembly, and the stated structure of the tongue and of the first slotand the second slot ensures that the tongue is locked when it is placedin both slots. Suitable mutual positioning of the first slot and thesecond slot permits the tongue, when placed in the first slot, to beclicked or snapped into position in the second slot by just a modestdeformation of the material.

The collar may be provided with two or more tongues with associatedpairs of slots, which results in greater stability, in particular incase of large collars. Further, the collar may have two or more pairs ofslots for each tongue, so that the collar may be made larger or smallerand thereby be adapted to animals in various sizes.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The invention will be described more fully below with reference to thedrawing, in which

FIG. 1 shows a preferred embodiment of a collar according to theinvention,

FIG. 2 shows a tongue and associated pair of slots on the collar of FIG.1,

FIG. 3 shows a section of the collar of FIG. 1 in the assembled state,and

FIG. 4 shows a section of the assembled collar along the line IV--IV inFIG. 3.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT

In the shown preferred embodiment the collar of the invention consistsof a flexible plastics material, such as HDPE or PP having a thicknessof about 0.8 mm. The collar in FIG. 1 has the shape of a circular ringsector with an angular extent of about 180°. The outer periphery 10 ofthe collar is a continuous circular arc, and four flaps or tongues 12having through openings by means of which the collar is secured to e.g.a band around the neck of a dog, are provided at the inner periphery 11of the collar.

The collar has three uniform protruding tongues 14, which are shown onan enlarged scale in FIG. 2, along a radius 13 which defines thecircular ring sector.

It will be seen from FIG. 2 that the tongue 14 is contiguous with therest of the collar, which constitutes a web 15, by means of a rib 16which constitutes a transition between the web 15 and the tongue 14. Therib 16 constitutes the inner end of the tongue, and immediately outsidethe rib 16 the rib 14 has a central part 17 which is wider than the rib16. The central part 17 of the tongue is the part of the tongue that hasstraight edges in FIG. 2, which converge toward the outer tongue end 18which is defined by a circular arc.

FIG. 2 also shows that the collar has a first slot 30 and a second slot40. These are through slots and are cut or punched without removal ofmaterial in the embodiment shown. The first slot 30 has a bent shapewhich resembles a C, and has a length measured as the distance betweenthe ends of its branches which is greater than the width of the centralpart 17 of the tongue 14. Owing to its C-shape the first slot 30 definesa short tongue 31, and the tongue 31 may be tilted by deformation of thematerial such that the first slot 30 opens so much as to enable theentire tongue 14 to be passed through the first slot 30. The slot 30 hasa straight central part 32 which is defined by branches 33 and 34forming an angle with the central part 32. The distance between thebranches 33 and 34 is greater than the width of the rib 16 and smallerthan the greatest width of the central part 17, and when the tongue 14has been passed through the first slot 30, the rib 16 may therefore bepresent in the area of the first slot 30 near its straight central part32, while in this position the central part 17 of the tongue, which iswider than the distance between the branches 33 and 34, cannot getthrough the first slot 30.

When the collar is assembled, the first slot 30 is opened and the tongueis passed completely through the slot 30, following which the rib 16 ofthe tongue is pulled back so that the rib is present at the straightcentral part 32 of the slot. Then the tongue 14 is tilted so that itsouter end 18 approaches the second slot 40. The second slot 40 has acurved C-shape, which corresponds to, but is not identical with theouter end 18 of the tongue. It is noted in particular that the secondslot 40 has an opening length measured as the distance between its freeends which permits the outer end 18 of the tongue to be passed throughthe slot 40, and that the opening length of the slot 40 is not largeenough to permit the wide central part 17 of the tongue to pass throughthe slot 40. With the tongue 14 passed through the first slot 30 andwith the rib 16 retracted to the central part 32, the outer end 18 ofthe tongue may be snapped or clicked through the second slot 40 bydeformation.

FIG. 3 shows the collar of FIG. 1 in the assembled state, with its threetongues 14 passed through respective first slots 30 and second slots 40.The wide central part 17 of each tongue 14 is present behind thebranches 33 and 34 of the first slot 30 in FIG. 3, so that the tonguescannot be pulled out of the first slots 30. It will moreover be seenthat the outer ends 18 of each tongue 14 protrude slightly through therespective second slots 40 in close contact with the edges thereof sothat the tongues 14 cannot be passed further through the second slots40, or at any rate not so much as will enable the wide central parts 17of the tongues 14 to get clear of the branches 33 and 34 of the firstslots 30. The tongues 14 are thus completely locked in their respectivepairs of associated first slot 30 and second slot 40.

The slots 30 and 40 are here shown as narrow slots which are producedwithout removal of material, but the invention is not restricted tothis, other shapes of slots being possible, e.g. where part of the shorttongues which are formed by the C-shaped slots, are removed so that theslots define openings having a finite opening area. To achieve thefunction mentioned here it is essential that the tongues have a rib ofshorter width than the central part of the tongues, and that the firstslots are in the shape of a C or a variant thereof, and it is likewiseimportant that the second slots permit only the outer ends of thetongues, but not their central parts, to be passed through the secondslots.

It will be seen from FIG. 1 that the collar has three radial rows ofassociated pairs of first and second slots so that the size of theassembled collar may be varied.

What is claimed is:
 1. A collar for mounting around the neck of ananimal, the collar comprising:web of a flexible material; a protrudingtongue contiguous with the web; a first through slot through which thetongue is passed when the collar is mounted around the neck of theanimal, the first slot having a length permitting the entire tongue tobe passed through the first slot; a second through slot spaced from thefirst slot by a distance less than the length of the tongue; the tonguebeing contiguous with the web being a rib having a specific width, thetongue having a central part of a width greater than the width of therib and an outer end of a width smaller than the width of the centralpart; the first slot having portions at opposed ends thereof, saidopposed portions being angled towards the second slot and having adistance between them which is greater than the width of the rib andsmaller than the width of the central part; and the spacing of the firstand second slots and the length of the tongue being such that when therib is present in the first slot, and the central part of the tongue hasits inner end adjacent the opposed angled portions, the outer end of thetongue can be positioned in the second slot.
 2. A collar according toclaim 1, further comprising at least one additional protruding tongue,each of the protruding tongue and the one additional protruding tonguehas an associated pair of first and second slots.
 3. A collar accordingto claim 2, further comprising at least one additional pair of first andsecond slots associated with each tongue.
 4. A collar for mountingaround the neck of an animal, the collar comprising:a web of a flexiblematerial; a protruding tongue contiguous with the web; a first throughslot through which the tongue is passed when the collar is mountedaround the neck of the animal, the first slot having a length permittingthe entire tongue to be passed through the first slot; a second slotspaced from the first slot by a distance less than the length of thetongue; the tongue being contiguous with the web being a rib having aspecific width, the tongue having a central part of a width greater thanthe width of the rib; and the tongue and the first slot and the secondslot being adapted to interact in such a manner that one of the slotsrestrict mutual movement of the tongue and the slots in a firstdirection, and that the other of the slots restrict mutual movement ofthe tongue and the slots in a second direction opposite the firstdirection.